This year we’ve planted a tiny crop (3/4 acre) of Coriander plants in an empty field just near our house (pictured above & below). We had a small batch of good quality, disease free seeds which we used for the planting. These seeds had actually been given to me as a thank you gift by some people last year – which might seem an odd gift to give, but then this is remote Africa – where shops are few & far between !
Anyway, the fact that the seed is of such good quality, the idea is that we grow the plants for their seeds, which will be harvested and in turn used to plant a bigger crop, who’s seed will be harvested to plant an even bigger crop and so on until we have a big enough crop to harvest the seed and sell it for export (keeping some back so that we can keep re planting). This is just one of the small “hobby” type projects which my husband has going on the farm, and it is actually more like a trial seeing as we have never grown it before. (You can just make out the tiny white flowers of the plant above - sometimes they can also be a pale pink colour).Coriander is also known as Cilantro or Chinese Parsley. It also goes by the name Dhania here in Tanzania, and I believe is native to various parts of both Africa and Asia. All parts of the plant are edible – the leaves, the seeds (fruit) and the roots.
If you’ve ever eaten Coriander before (especially the leaves) you will recognize the taste as it is quite distinctive. The leaves are commonly used as a garnish for curries and hot dishes – heat destroys their flavour quite quickly which is why they are used mainly as a garnish. I sometimes add torn Coriander leaves to salads or dips (you can see my Yogurt Sauce For Curry recipe over here and my Mango Salsa recipe over here, both of which contain Coriander leaves.) They are also great when added to salsas and chutneys.The hard round fruits (which grow to a maximum diameter of 5 mm - photo above) are also known as coriander seeds and can be eaten when they are still green. The best way to use these though (in my opinion !) is once they are dried and then they are great lightly toasted in a pan and ground before being added to curries and other dishes. I always keep a stock of the seeds on hand, as toasting and grinding them & adding the fresh powder to a dish (as pictured below) gives much more flavour than using already ground seeds which you can buy in a bottle as Coriander powder.
The whole seeds (fruits) can also used as part of a pickling spice (for example pickled onions or gherkins), in sausage fillings and even as part of a spice mix/cure for dried meat (known as Biltong here in Africa).
The roots of the Coriander plant have quite an intense flavour and are often used in Thai dishes and curry pastes. (I have never used the roots for cooking before, but perhaps that's something I'll try soon !)
I’ll keep you posted on how the first crop goes, and no doubt you’ll see a few recipes cropping up on the blog which contain coriander as an ingredient in the near future !
